CPR
by just4ubb
Summary: A oneshot that I wrote for a friend's birthday one million years ago. Emmett/OC


Over in the corner of the room, Bella was choking. It wasn't a big deal, really. She did it quite often. Reminded me of that Old MacDonald song. _"Old MacDonald had a farm . . . And on that farm he had Bella . . . With a cough cough there, and a cough cough there, here a cough, there a cough, everywhere a cough cough . . ."_

"Emmett, please!" Edward muttered, calmly performing the Heimlich maneuver on his human girlfriend. I didn't see the attraction of humans. Sure, Bella was great fun to impress and cook for, but I really couldn't imagine how Edward could handle it. She smelled great. That was a fact. Flowery. Like freesia, maybe. And then there was the fact that he couldn't _do_ anything with her, or even touch her with passion until she was a vampire, just because she was so breakable. And hell, he _wanted_ to touch her. She was pretty.

"Beautiful, Em."

"Can't you just turn it off, Edward? That is really annoying. Stop commenting on my thoughts!" I said, watching the tiny piece of mushroom fly across the room.

"Oh god. This is really embarrassing. Just . . . Ugh!" Bella buried her face in her hands and I could see, smell, feel the heat of blood pooling easily beneath her cheeks.

"Don't worry, love. It's no big deal. You can't help it-"

I cut off Edward's feel-good speech, listening for the hum of Rose's car coming back along the road. Rosalie. Now she was beautiful. Statuesque, magnificent, ravishing, _sexy_ . . . Not to mention that I owed her my life-after-death. Had she not saved me, I would have been bear-food a long time ago.

"-We all care about your well-being, love. Your safety is our number one priority."

Bella nodded, obviously tiring of the topic. Not that Edward would ever notice that. He was far too eloquent for his own good.

"And if you were to ever get into serious trouble, well, we're all capable of turning you, obviously, but there's always basic first aid courses. I'm sure we all know CPR-"

"Hold it," I said. "I don't know CPR."

"Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation."

"God, Edward. How stupid do you think I am? I know what the abbreviation stands for. What I don't know is how exactly I'm supposed to go around making people live again."

You'd have to worry about squashing ribcages when pumping away at the heart . . . Far too frustrating.

"It's just restraint, Em. Like stroking a soap bubble," Edward said mushily, stroking Bella's face. It was soppy as hell, but the sudden look in Bella's eyes reflected the burning emotion that was practically always in my brother's.

"And getting the right rhythm," Bella added. "The Beegees song, Stayin' Alive has the right beat for it."

"And the title choice reflects the action," I pointed out dryly, imaging the irony of popping someone's lung in the process of blowing air in.

"I'm sure that it won't come to that though. Even if it's physically possible. And besides. I'm sure that nothing will happen that puts you into that situation, Em."

**A MONTH LATER . . .**

I looked around at the elaborate wedding set up. "Rosie . . . Is all this really necessary? I love you, you love me . . . is all this material stuff important when it comes to us being together?"

I could understand the first wedding. Hell, I could the first six or so weddings. But now it was just getting ridiculous. I was married to her and we knew it. Did the humans really matter?

If it was just an excuse for another honeymoon . . . Well that could really be retitled as a vacation. Sometimes I felt my Rose was just a bit high-maintenance. God, I felt so bad for that. I owed her everything, and I repaid her with these treacherous thoughts.

"Emmett. That's not the right word," Edward said from upstairs. "Treacherous. They're not treacherous."

Yeah. Sure. What else would they be. I was betraying _the love of my life_. Not physically. In that realm, nobody compared, but with my _mind_.

"Emmett. It's not betrayal."

"What the hell are you two bumbling on about?" My goddess snapped, not even bothering to pull her swinging golden locks out from under the hood of Carlisle's mercedes. She was busily keeping herself occupied for the next couple of hours until the wedding. Alice had been adamant that the whole 'groom must not see the bride' thing should be obeyed, and Rose had gone along with it.

Edward rattled off some long detailed explanation about some minor league baseball player who had recently switched to different team. Handily, it was something that she took absolutely no interest in that sort of thing whatsoever, and quickly shut my brother up.

"Like I was saying, Em. It's not treachery."

"Then what is it, Edward?! If you can tell me that, then I'll believe you, but you can't. You can't tell me that it's not treachery, that it's not breaking every vow that has ever been taken on the subject!"

"Emmett. No."

"I'm going hunting," I muttered, jumping out the window. "I need to think some stuff through without the telepath here commenting on my every thought."

I ran, jumping the river easily. I needed time to think.

"Emmett, we are getting back to our hotel room now! God, it's not _that_ out of the ordinary for newly weds to spend their entire honeymoon in bed. Sightseeing isn't important in the grand scheme of acting human." Rosie was being snippy. She was upset and for good reason. London, our original destination, had been suddenly struck by sunshine. Or would be struck by sunshine within the next couple of hours.

"Can't we go see the bears first?" I asked, delaying the inevitable. I had done some extreme thinking over my elongated hunting trip. Enough that we had been forced to shift the wedding back a couple of weeks until Rose and Alice could have their sunset wedding wedding reception. Which had given me more time to mull over my relationship.

And the conclusion that I had come to was short and not-so-sweet. I only had three real reasons that I was with Rosie. The first was that she had saved my life because she thought I was cute. That was really two reasons, but I counted it as one because without the latter, the former would never have taken place. My second reason was that she was undeniably, strikingly beautiful. He hair, her lips, her face, her body . . . it was all shaped, molded into perfection, flawless. My last reason was that she was handy with a toolbox. The alterations that she had performed on my jeep were . . . phenomenal. The engine was smoother, but still had that hearty grunt. And the _speed_.

I had also come to the conclusion that it really wasn't enough. I was going to break up with my wife. I idly wondered how many sets of divorce papers I would need to fill out. One for each marriage? Or would one cover the lot? I was going to get a _divorce_. Me. Emmett. It had always been me and Rosie. The hunky, well-muscled guy with the goofy smile and the sexy, voluptuous woman with the killer glare. But no longer.

Standing outside the enclosure, I breathed in past the bear stink until I reached the thick, rich blood. My venom flowed easily.

"We came. We saw them. Now can we please go crack a few walls?!"

I turned to look at her. "Rosie. I need to talk to you about something. Can we go someplace private?"

"Whatever you want, Emmett."

I dragged her unceremoniously out the front entrance as quickly as I could without arousing suspicion. We stood in a confrontational position next to the huge sign of the zoo.

"Emmett. Get this over with. We're wasting honeymoon hours here."

"Rosalie Lillian Hale. We've been together longer than most people could ever imagine," I began. So far so good. I was following the plan. Whenever I winged through these things I usually ended up spewing out tall tales or innuendoes. "We've had some fun times, we've had some bad times, we've had some goddamn tense times, but through it all, we've been together. I've been thinking things over recently and I've come to realize that maybe we shouldn't have been. Maybe we're not a compatible couple. A marriage is supposed to be equality and love. Our marriage is you dominating and ordering while I blindly do as you say. I always thought it was because I love you. But the truth is, I don't. I love your body. I love what you did for my vehicle. But mostly, I feel like I owe you my existence. Rosalie, I want a divorce."

I stared at her steadily, ready to throw her over my shoulder if she showed any sign of violence towards our surroundings or the humans.

She grimaced, very slightly, then without warning, flung her handbag away and stalked, seething, into some nearby bushes before she became a blur moving through the trees.

At the sound of a faint thud, I smoothly shifted her out of my eyesight to see the commotion.

"Holly?! Holly?! Holly, are you okay?!" A girl said, kneeling over motionless figure of another girl. "Holly?! Does anybody know first aid?!"

Worried for the human, I hurried over to inspect the damage that Rosalie's purse had inflicted. It was an intricate purse, covered with random metal spikes. There were faint red indentations where the bag had collided with her forehead.

The girl -Holly?- groaned, lifting one hand to her head. "What happened?"

"You were hit by an unidentified flying projectile," I said, sliding the offending leather into my jacket. "My father is a doctor. Do you mind if I-?" I gestured at her head.

"Sure. Yeah," her friend said, seeing as Holly's eyes were still clenched firmly shut. "But if you try anything, Mister, I have taken self defense courses." She tried to look threatening.

"Of course. But I'm not the type," I said, dropping my Edward language. "Anyone have a flashlight? And an icepack."

"I have an LED torch on my keychain," her friend said. "But I'm not sure about the icepack. Holly has some spare change though. Maybe we could get a cold drink from a vending machine?"

"Okay. Whatever works," I replied, then spoke to the semi-conscious girl. "Can you open your eyes for me? It might be a bit bright at first. And your ears may ring a little. Hopefully you'll just have headache, instead of a concussion. But I'm a dab hand at treating concussion. My brother's girlfriend is a disaster zone."

It was at that point that I noticed she wasn't breathing. I thought back to the medical textbook Edward had given me for Christmas.

_**'Give artificial respiration if the breathing stops.'**_

I tipped her chin back, arching her neck like it had been in the picture. Looking down at her bare, exposed throat, I was hit with the painful urge to sink my teeth into her flesh. Resisting from even smelling her, I squeezed her nose as tenderly as I could, thinking of the breakable cartilage. I lowered my mouth onto hers and blew air very gently into her, watching her chest absently from the corner of my eye. It was supposed to rise and fall before I repeated.

I couldn't help but notice the texture and feel of her mouth. It was soft and smooth. Rosalie's had been soft and smooth but that was different. Her soft had been like silk stretched over granite and her smooth was like polished marble floors. This girl had supple lips and her smooth was soft, like well-moisturized skin. Which, on second thoughts, was what it was.

It was strange the way I could almost feel when her lungs were full. With each flow of oxygen, I could tell when she was at maximum capacity.

To see if she could breathe on her own now, I took a moment to consider what I was doing. Right then, giving medical care to the young - fourteen at most- human girl, I had never felt more free or happy. Knowing that I was where I had chosen to be. It was a great feeling. What surprised me was the utter lack of thought about Rosalie. I know where she was or what she was doing and I didn't care. I worried that she was upset, but that was in the way that I would worry about Alice, Esme and Bella.

"Can you sit up, Holly?" I asked and she motioned yes. I propped her up against a telephone booth.

"Well, here's the icepack," her friend said. "And here's the light."

"Will you open your eyes, Holly?" I had heard from Carlisle that patients responded better to their names.

"No." She mumbled, squeezing them shut even more. "My head feels like somebody drove a train in one ear and out the other."

I blinked. "Uhh, please, Holly?"

She opened her eyes and I looked at her pupils. They were both the same size, which according to my medical textbook, indicated that she didn't have a concussion. Among other specifications, of course, which I had already crossed off my potential checklist.

A small part of me couldn't help but wonder why I was even bothering with the human. She would obviously be okay, so there was no real point to me fussing over little details like whether or not she was exceptionally pale or drowsy. What it came down to was that I didn't want to have to go after Rosalie, because without a doubt she would end up throwing me into a tree.

So I wordlessly held out the red can. She took it warily and pressed it to the side of her face. The wind gusted a bit and a few strands of her hair stuck to the condensation. I plucked them off, noting the color. It was similar to Esme's hair, a vivid, creamy brown. As her head turned, the light caught and it took on an auburn shine. It was very pretty.

I was abruptly struck by intense curiosity about the girl. My brief once over had only noticed that she was a girl. Now I needed more. I needed a real image to put to her name. Her eyes were a very light-toned hazel. Almost a veggie vampiric gold. Despite the relatively pale shade though, her eyes had depth, like a bottomless pool. A very mysterious, beautiful, bottomless pool.

"Holly?!" the other girl said. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine now," she said, then turned to me. "Hey, thanks for helping out with the whole me falling over. Do you know what it was? The thing that hit me?"

"No. I don't know," I lied, offering her a hand up. When she was standing fully upright, she was tiny, barely over five feet tall.

"Well, the bears are waiting. Bye," she waved at me, rummaging through her own bag for some money.

_Goodbye, Holly._

I walked away, into the shrubs.

To think that not so long ago I had been taunting Edward and worried about him for doing the exact same thing that I was now doing. Sitting in the corner of a human girl's bedroom, watching her sleep. I wasn't sure exactly why I was here, but my excuse was being locked out of mine and Rosalie's hotel room. Which was full of holes. I had a fully loaded black credit card in my pocket.

My other stray thought was that somebody would need to keep an eye out for the typical signs of concussion. Not all of them happened straight away, a lesson that I had learned the hard way with Bella.

I had to wake her up every three hours and check that her ears weren't leaking. I was, very subtly, and she wasn't.

Waking her up was a matter of jumping out her window and banging against the side of her house, hard. She would be awake in an instant and therefore not suffering concussion. Or so my book said.

Feeling my cellphone vibrate in my pocket, I leapt out her window and gave a perfunctory smack to the wall before answering a safe distance away.

"Alice wants you to know that Rosalie is coming to bring you home. It would be better if she didn't find you ogling a stranger."

"Nice to hear from you too, Edward."

"You know, Alice didn't see the divorce coming. Nobody did, really. I suspected, from your thoughts, but it seemed so unbelievable. You and Rose have always been together."

"Not anymore."

"I want you to know that I support you, no matter what you decide to do. You're a good person, Em. You deserve the best."

"Thanks, Edward. I'm glad you think so," I said, hanging up.

Half an hour later, I was back in her room, thinking very hard. Since I'd met Rosalie, I'd never given much thought to what I wanted or what made me happy. And as I was slowly coming to realize, humans made me happy. Their delicacy, their emotion, their short lives; it made them so much more willing to live life to the full, it made them more interesting and fun to be around.

I dialed a number on my phone by heart.

"Edward?"

"Yes?"

"Tell Esme that I'm not coming back. I've found something better right here."


End file.
